[cha1n]

I have the issue that my flexor muscles and tendons are pretty strong, I've been climbing approximately 5 years and have always kept the intensity high. No fingerboarding or training during this time but I've always climbed quite finger intensive problems, I've not been swinging around on jugs or anything.

The problem I have is that I can easily pull hard on stuff but my pulleys always give out, even when I'm not using a full crimp, but it happens quicker if I crimp with a thumb. I don't really know what to do. I'd happily drop the intensity and with a more structured fingerboard approach if there was some solid evidence that my pulleys would get stronger but otherwise, I'm worried of the strength loss I'd get dropping the intensity for a significant amount of time. Sometimes I can get away with week of pulling hard crimped/half-crimped, other times it takes a few sessions of pulling hard for my pulleys to get really sore and they always take months to feel better.

I suppose in the long run, it doesn't matter if my muscles and tendons are stronger than my pulleys if I'm going to get injured the second I pull too hard. It's like having a fast car that limited to 50mph, so frustrating.

[TheTwig]

If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck then it's a duck. Stop climbing so much fingery stuff all the time? I can climb harder than I often do but I don't because it's not worth it. If this is a reoccuring problem then it's likely you'll end up with scar tissue that will take your max speed down to 40mph to use your analogy. Climb more open handed and try and vary your style more to give your body a bit of a rest? You don't have to drop the intensity, go climb some cave problems or something.

If you are getting reoccuring injuries it's a warning sign you need to change something!

[cha1n]

I can see why you would make that assumption but I've spent the last 3 years climbing mostly open-handed due to recurring pulley injuries. I can climb quite hard stuff open handed but it really restricts what you can climb and with limestone season looming I'm looking for a solution.

[jwi]

You probably don't want to hear this, but both ligaments and tendons get stronger by doing high volume/low intensity training. Alas, they do not get stronger by high intensity (and therefore low volume) training.

This is one of two reasons that every sensible climber put in a block of basic preparation with high volume of climbing, even if they are only doing bouldering/short route.

[abarro81]

but both ligaments and tendons get stronger by doing high volume/low intensity training. Alas, they do not get stronger by high intensity (and therefore low volume) training.

Got any links to this? I've often wondered on how these things adapt but never spent much time trying to look into it..

[jwi]

2 s of googling should turn up something. It is stated in pretty much every physiology text book with a slant towards training. Lots of research papers as well. Don't have time right now, get back to you on wednesday if you haven't found anything.

[cha1n]

Interesting jwi, I'll look into this. Most training stuff mentioned that ligaments and tendons strengthen slower than muscle (obviously) but had no idea that they don't respond well to high intensity. I was sacking off the time thing as 5 years seems sufficient to me for the pulleys to have got quite strong by now but they haven't.

Maybe a months of repeaters or something would help things along

[duncan]

I googled 'strengthening tendons high volume low intensity'.

The first link I found suggested the best way to strengthen tendons was with high volume low intensity exercise, the second recommended low volume high intensity exercise and the third, and I'm not making this up, said: "...bodybuilding-style training, with repetitions and impact neither too high nor too low, may be the best approach stimulating the growth of tendons."

[tomtom]

When I got back into climbing hard c.6-7 years ago (or something like that) I tweaked my pulleys fairly regularly - but not had much trouble in the last couple of years despite trying harder and re-introducing the crimp into my arsenal (after several years of deliberately avoiding..).

My elbows start to twinge when I'm within a 5m radius of a campus board however....

[cha1n]

So as usual with biological science, nobody has a clue!

[tomtom]

So as usual with biological science, nobody has a clue!

What we really need is a young person to train steadily for climbing for 8 years, and sacrifice a finger every year so it can be dissected and the tendon strength tested properly.. Ideally several volunteers needed on several different training programs - plus repeats

)

[Oldmanmatt]

So as usual with biological science, nobody has a clue!

What we really need is a young person to train steadily for climbing for 8 years, and sacrifice a finger every year so it can be dissected and the tendon strength tested properly.. Ideally several volunteers needed on several different training programs - plus repeats

)

No, no, no.

We need identical quadruplets.

Training the different methods.

Possibly four sets of Quads.

Each set starting at different ages.

Ensuring of course that they all have the same variety of diets (down to individual meals) and......

[Dexter]

So as usual with biological science, nobody has a clue!

What we really need is a young person to train steadily for climbing for 8 years, and sacrifice a finger every year so it can be dissected and the tendon strength tested properly.. Ideally several volunteers needed on several different training programs - plus repeats

)

No, no, no.

We need identical quadruplets.

Training the different methods.

Possibly four sets of Quads.

Each set starting at different ages.

Ensuring of course that they all have the same variety of diets (down to individual meals) and......

no no we need sets of dodecuplets so we have 3 repeats (maybe 4 sets for different ages etc.).

[Sasquatch]

This is why we should start cloning

[petejh]

You could focus on crimping less and deliberately seeking out more balance to your climbing diet by getting into compression, slopers and steep cave-style probs, instead of just doing 'finger intensive problems' ...

[cha1n]

When I say finger intensive problems, I mean I climb on holds that would work finger strength, just to emphasise that my fingers should be strong.

I don't think I've climbed a hard crimpy problem for a year or more down to injuries.

This weekend I tried the terrace and Brad pit which are both crimpy on the right hand. Today a pulley on my right hand is sore. I don't find the moves on the problems that hard but I have to hold back how hard I pull because I know I'll get injured. I never had any pain in my right hand before the weekend!

[Eddies]

Regards finger injuries it's always worth baring in mind the basics (apologies if I'm teaching you to suck eggs). Warm up / down and rest a few mins between attempts, and if you catch the crimper badly or you foot slips don't try to bone it out but let go rest and try again. Looking back all of my finger injuries could have been prevented by following this basic advice.

[Bencil]

Any thoughts on glucosamine as a supplement to aid tendon healing?

[krymson]

There is a video in the training for climbing thread with an italian sports doctor talking about campus board training concepts. He reiterates the high volume low or mid intensity line.

Im just a single data point but here's my anecdote: I hated low intensity when i started climbing(basically bouldering a lot or trying hard stuff when i did get outdoors) and was constantly having pulley issues anytime i got near a crimp.

Last year I got into trad and did 6 months of low/medium intensity stuff outdoors on lots of (fairly decent sized) crimps followed up by 6 months sport outdoors - Id say mid intensity on the fingers. I'm getting back into bouldering now and my fingers are now stronger and healthier than they've ever been.

[blamo]

Any thoughts on glucosamine as a supplement to aid tendon healing?

I am a total sucker for anything with even marginal evidence of preventing finger injuries.  I dump a large amount of money into placebos. 

[abarro81]

I googled last night and couldn't find anything remotely conclusive looking on best intensity...

[tommy_k]

I am a total sucker for anything with even marginal evidence of preventing finger injuries.  I dump a large amount of money into placebos. 

Here you go:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21117902

It's only conclusive if you are a rabbit though... 

[slackline]

So as usual with biological science, nobody has a clue!

Thats not true at all.  For vast swathes of biology a lot is well established from the rigorous application of the reductionist scientific method.  Molecular biology, membrane transportation, evolution by natural selection, neuron function, how muscles actually contract, I could go on and on and on the list is massive, just as it is with other areas of scientific research.

However, the money available to fund research into the optimal strategy for strengthening finger tendons is, I would suggest, not very large because across all of the aspects of biomedical research its a very low priority. 

SCIENCE is a very good way of understanding the world around us but it doesn't automatically mean that absolutely every single aspect has been studied and researched in great detail and such knowledge will be readily available for the general public to ask on forums "Whats best?" and get  in-depth answers that are unequivocal.  In fact a lot of science is done precisely because there is uncertainty about how things work.

If you want to do some research yourself  into what has been done with regards to strengthening tendons then I'd suggest starting with buying Dave MacLeods new book as he's spent a lot of time searching the literature and that will give you a good set of starting references to search for further literature.  Use Google Scholar and PubMed to look up these papers and see what work they cite and also what subsequent work cites them.  Read all of the papers in detail, making sure you understand not just the physiology but also the statistics, strengths and weaknesses of each study and synthesise a systematic review of evidence.  The Cochrane Handbook provides a good framework for conducting systematic reviews.  Then share your findings here for others to benefit from, you could perhaps even look into writing it up for publication in a peer reviewed journal.

[erm, sam]

Though I climb at a lower level than you I have spent years being limited not by finger strength but by finger injuries. I took me a very long time to understand this.  I have spent the last year or so doing fingerboarding, but at a level intended to strengthen resistance to injury/soreness rather than to get stronger. Obvs I hope the latter will eventually take over. I didn't realise I was doing this when I started, rather I was commited to fingerboarding at a level that didn't produce niggles rather than fingerboard at a level I thought was appropriate for me based on what my mates could do.

I can hang half crimp with bodyweight on a medium campus rung for a while, but not without getting sore fingers after a bit.
I have been doing fingerboarded repeaters on a big rung with scales to take the weight off with the goal to be able to do all hangs and all sets with no soreness during the hang or afterwards. I am not talking about the ok soreness of " I have worked hard" but the specific sore spot in a finger type soreness.

People I climb with find it hard to believe that I fingerboard at such a low level but over time I have really noticed a decrease in finger soreness when climbing fingery problems. And the level I am comfortable at has increased. Slowly.

So, if finger injuries are holding you back, or fear of them, then worrying about losing strength is really missing the point. You are not getting the chance to fully apply this strength at the moment so what are you really going to lose?

Fingerboarding is good because you can be so precise in how you build up the loading.

A key thing for me is to have a varied range of goals so that when I slightly overdo it and feel a micro tweak I can back off and do something else, eg One armer training or what have you so that you can get your training fix without having to push on with the slightly tweaked bit...

I think you can still climb outside at what ever level you want when doing the remedial training but you have to keep backing off when ever you feel that "its not injured or even sore but it is trying to tell me something" feeling.

[cha1n]

What I would give to go back to when I first started climbing and didn't know what a finger injury was. When I used to pull at 100% and not give a second thought to the consequences. Good times.

Think I might start training endurance/power endurance and sack the bouldering season off then (for pulling hard at least). That should give my fingers a break and I'll see if this lower intensity stuff works for healing pulleys and report back.

Thanks for all of the replies.